


skid marks

by Hugabug



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: Guns, Missing Persons, Multi, Murder, Vigilante Murder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-02
Updated: 2018-03-02
Packaged: 2019-03-26 01:14:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13846947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hugabug/pseuds/Hugabug
Summary: or in which Ricky Goldsworth makes monsters wherever he goes, and this time he leaves one in the form of Benjamin “Banjo” Mcclintock.





	skid marks

**Author's Note:**

> warning: the implication that someone may be a sex worker is used as an insult here so proceed with caution.

When the crowd scatters, like leaves in the crisp autumn air, Cesca grabs his arm and they take off running, tripping over themselves as their hands clumsily try to return their guns to their holsters. The safety is off, and its dangerous to do it while on the move, but years in this kind of life have taught them that self-preservation means nothing when faced by one wrong move.

Once they reach their motel, the door slams shut and they fall, heaving and shaking, against it.

“Rich, what the fuck.” Cesca curses him out, almost immediately.

Ricky scrubs a hand over his face. “Fuck off.”

“ _Fuck off_?! Is that the best you can come up with?!”

“I panicked, ok!” He’s seeing double, cold sweat dripping down the curve of his forehead.

Cesca sends him an incredulous look. “You  _panicked_?” she hisses, anger boiling in her eyes. “You put us in  _danger_ , you reckless asshole!”

“Well, what was I suppose to do?” Ricky feels his head pound, blood roaring heavy in his ears. He pushes himself off from the door and sheds his jacket before his holster, throwing both at the bed in defeat. Again, not proper gun safety, but at this point, he can’t bring himself to care. The room is spinning, his lungs are gasping for breath, and he swears, he can head CC chuckling in his ear.

“ _Told you these feelings of yours was gonna get you in deep shit some day, Ricky_.”

“Shut up.” he grits his teeth. “Fuck!”

“Fuck, Rich,” Cesca curses, her eyes are darting to every corner of the room, like suddenly there are bugs and cameras where bugs and cameras have never been before, the paranoia sinking in. “Fucking– If you hadn’t bothered with that goddamn bartender– if you hadn’t– oh my god, Ricky–”

“Don’t,” he turns on her, arm outstretched, finger pointed at her in warning. His eyes smart, water gathering at the corners, and rapidly, he blinks them away. Glares at his partner. “Don’t  _fucking_  call me that.”

Cesca’s jaw clicks shut.

She lifts her hands up in hopes to appease, fingers no longer trembling like they had been moments before. Suddenly, they’re at a standstill, Ricky’s accusing finger the gun to Cesca’s sure surrender. Outside, the sun has set, the wind carrying the faint sounds of a police siren to their trained ears as eerie blue and red lights flash in the distance, signalling the end of a reign of terror. And the beginning of yet another month on the run.

Ricky lowers his guard. So does Cesca.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles, after a beat of silence. “I’m sorry, I just–”

“It’s not your fault.” Cesca cuts him off, shaking her head. She stays in place, though, rooted to the spot, rudely reminded of a wound that has yet to properly heal. Ricky sees it in her round, brown eyes, flooded with sudden pain and pity. He looks away.

“This… we can still salvage this.” She says, after another beat of silence. Ricky keeps his eyes on the ground. “We can still stay, follow the trail. We can find him, Rich. We can still find C–”

A knock on the door cuts her off.

Immediately, they’re on alert, defense stances at ready, eyes trained on the motel door. The knocking persists and Cesca cocks her gun. Gives him a little nod.

Ricky walks forward and peaks through the pigeon hole.

A second later, he opens the door.

“What are you doing here?” he demands, though the words come out more awed than angry.

Benjamin “Banjo” Mcclintock scratches the back of his neck, like a teenager at his first school dance. He’s tall and lanky and his large frame casts a shadow over not just Ricky, but Cesca, too. So seeing him suddenly reduced to a blushing child is more than just a little odd. Nevertheless, the sight sends a jolt of endearment down Ricky’s spine. It makes him sick.

“I needed to see you,” Banjo tells him, earnestly, all midwestern charm and an honest to god smile of relief. “I needed to _thank_  you. You killed a monster for us–”

Ricky snarls. “Save it, Ben.”

He tries to close the door, but Banjo sticks his foot in between to stop it. Ricky sends a panicked look Cesca’s way. She, wide eyed, just shrugs, completely at a loss.

“How many times do I have to tell you,” Banjo says, hand closing around Ricky’s on the door handle. “Don’t call me Ben.”

The warmth from his large fingers seep into Ricky’s knuckles and seemingly burns its way up his arm. He stares at the point of contact, swallowing hard, and looks back up to meet this overly friendly bar tender in the eye. Banjo is looking at him again in the exact same way he had when Ricky first entered his tavern, and Ricky (in that same moment and in this), suddenly feels like maybe his real nickname will sound better at home in this man’s mouth.

Because where CC was life under fire and frantic kisses and the constant fear that every night will be their last, Banjo is…

Banjo could be home.

Ricky yanks his hand away. “The bastard had it coming,” he says, casting his eyes to the ground. “I’m glad I shot him dead.”

Behind him, Cesca makes a strained sound. Again, Ricky turns to see her expression, and she looks back at him with that same pain and fear written in her eyes. Only amplified, ten times a thousand. She makes an aborted move to lift her gun once more, but she stops, flicking her eyes at Banjo, before taking a step back, biting her lip. Ricky feels a lump in his throat form– she’s still so young. Barely out of her early twenties. She’d lost CC just last year. Now, standing here, she just might lose Ricky, too.

“Rich?”

“I’m sorry,” Richard says, as sincerely as he can. He turns back to the man on the other side of the door, staring up at wide, earnest eyes and a bed head of unruly black hair. A week ago, Richard had run his fingers through those locks and yanked it back in his fist before soothing the pain with kisses. But now, any whimsy, any kind of memory he may have about this man or this town, he locks away in the back of his head, to be forgotten. At the end of the day, Ricky’s ledger is soaked in blood, and Banjo…

Banjo could be home, but Cesca needs him. CC needs him.

Ricky has always been selfish. He can’t be, anymore.

“Francesca,” he calls out.

Immediately, Cesca cocks her gun.

Banjo’s eyes widen. “Rich–”

“You saw nothing.” Ricky opens the door wide and yanks the other man inside their cramped motel room, hard. Banjo stumbles in, tripping and falling to the floor, his hands the only thing stopping him from hitting the ground. Cesca trains her gun at him as Ricky slams the door shut. “You heard nothing.”

“Rich, I don’t understand. I told you, nobody’s gonna–”

“Shut. _Up_.” Ricky hisses, moving around the room to gather their things. He can feel Banjo’s eyes following him, pleading, begging, but Ricky refuses to meet them. He grabs their duffel bag out from under one of the twin beds and opens it up to stuff as many clothes in it as possible. When he finishes, he pulls out a second duffel, this one filled with cash. He takes some out, about two handfuls of crumpled twenties, and haphazardly throws it in the face of the man kneeling on the floor.

“There.” Richard says, finally meeting Banjo’s gaze. He feels cold, inside and out, just like he always does right before he pulls a trigger. He sneers. “That’s for the other night.”

Cesca gasps. But Banjo…

He glares at Ricky, hurt and hate a deadly mix in his brown eyes. “Fuck you.”

Ricky throws the room keys toward Cesca. She catches them effortlessly.

“Lock him in,” he tells her, hauling both their bags over his shoulders before picking up his jacket and holster. Haphazardly, he holds them in his right while his left holds the door open. “We’re gonna split.”

The gun stays trained on Banjo, but the man’s eyes stay glued to the floor and to the crumpled wads of cash sitting peacefully on it. Ricky winces at the sight– it’s fairly pathetic. And knowing that he was the cause leaves his stomach in knots.

Cesca whispers to him, “Rich, we don’t need to leave like this.”

“If we don’t, he’ll follow us.” Ricky tells her. Tells himself. He swallows back down the bile that rises to his mouth. “Besides, what’ll CC think?”

A chuckle in his ear. A deep rumbling sigh. “ _Oh, baby. I think you already know what I think_.”

Ricky grits his teeth and pulls the door shut.

When the keys slide the lock in place, Cesca grabs his arm and they make a run to their get away car, sitting pretty at the back of the motel parking lot. In the distance, police sirens grow fainter as the keepers of the peace leave a little too early for a murder this brutal. The body of a town menace holds no interest to the eyes of the law. Ricky snarls in their direction, reaching for the last strains of his every present anger. He finds some there, but not all, and he snarls some more in overcompensation. Without another word, he starts their engine and rolls out of this god forsaken town, leaving black rubber marks on the cracked pavement.

Beside him, Cesca swallows. Hard. “I’m sorry, Rich.”

Ricky floors it. “Shut up.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr ver.](http://en-sam-malas.tumblr.com/post/171449723895/skid-marks)


End file.
